Posted on 09/17/2014 2:45:27 AM PDT by markomalley
Russia on Tuesday accused the West of ignoring its warnings about the growing terrorist threat in Syria, and claimed that the moderate rebel front – the one the Obama administration wants to arm as part of its anti-ISIS strategy – “no longer exists.”
The remarks by Russia’s ambassador in Geneva Alexey Borodavkin came during a session of the U.N. Human Rights Council, which was discussing the most recent report by a U.N.-mandated independent commission of inquiry into the conflict.
The report, released late last month and roughly covering the first half of this year, recorded atrocities by the Assad regime and by some of its opponents, including the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS/ISIL).
“The commission in its report,” Borodavkin told the council through a translator, “recognizes that the Syrian government is working against a huge army of trained armed terrorists.”
“The Free Syrian Army no longer exists,” he continued. “Armed groups qualified as ‘moderate’ are closely coordinating their activities with terrorist groups.”
(video at link)
The Free Syrian Army (FSA) is the mainstream rebel movement affiliated to the U.S.-recognized Syrian National Coalition which the administration wants to train and equip to fight ISIS jihadists in Syria. Lawmakers are expected to vote as early as Wednesday to authorize the proposal.
The commission of inquiry report to which Borodavkin referred does not state that the FSA no longer exists. It does say however that “ideological, political, tribal and personal” divisions and rivalries among rebel groups had prevented them from becoming more effective, and that “[e]fforts by external backers to reinforce the so-called ‘vetted moderate armed opposition’ failed to reverse the dominance of radical armed groups.”
The report also says that where “groups labeled as moderate” managed to score military successes against the regime they did so “closely coordinating with extremist groups, including the al-Qaeda-affiliated Jabhat al-Nusra.”
Borodavkin used his intervention in Geneva to chide countries – especially Western countries opposed to Syrian President Bashar Assad – for their approach to the three-and-a-half-year civil war.
“It’s clearer than ever that the real threat to Syrian statehood and the whole region is the activity of terrorist groups,” he said.
“I’d like to remind you that Russia right from the beginning suggested that we unite the efforts of the international community, the Syrian authorities and the moderate opposition to combat jihadists.
“If we had been heard at the time, the spread of this cancerous tumor could have been stopped,” Borodavkin said.
“Now, regrettably, we must admit that our worst scenarios have materialized: the Islamic State [ISIS] has seized a third of the country’s territory, have proclaimed the Syrian city of Raqqa as a capital of their ‘caliphate’ and is committing heinous crimes. This is supplemented by violent raging of other terrorist groups.”
The Russian envoy said the new international focus on countering ISIS was to be welcomed, citing a meeting convened by France on Monday at which 26 countries, Russia and the U.S. among them, expressed support for a broad campaign against the jihadist group.
Russia was willing to contribute to the effort, he said.
On the sidelines of the meeting in Paris, Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said Russian help in the anti-ISIS campaign included providing military and other assistance to Iraq “to strengthen its ability to ensure security.”
Moscow was “also providing military and other aid to Syria,” he said, as well as to other countries in the region, including Egypt, Yemen, Lebanon and Jordan.
Russia does not, however, support President Obama proposal to extend airstrikes against ISIS from Iraq into Syria, insisting that it would violate international law.
The point in the area is not what people say, it’s what they do. Assad HAS to demand the Golon be given back. But he has done nothing about it.
That’s the biggest failure in Iraq after the US pullout from the nascent “sovereign, stable and self-reliant” Islamic Republic, which I for one always decry. They were never ready for self-government; they immediately drafted an Islamic constitution once that was handed to them.
Ultimately, all factions there (save the Kurds FWICS) are our enemy and deserve no “backing” from us.
~Unfortunately when there was a chance to overthrow the twelver nutjobs a few years ago, Obama didn’t even offer a few words of support. Contrast that with his multi jumbotron speech broadcast to crowds in Cairo which brought the muslim brotherhood to power.~
Yes, I remember unrests in Iran back when. If they were serious they could apply about as much pressure as McCain and Nuland did in Ukraine and the mullah would be toast.
That’s like saying Iran’s “done nothing about it”. Assad, like the Mullahs, always acts via proxies such as Hezbollah and even Hamas of the Muslim Brotherhood.
There is no “lesser evil” there.
And of course you can’t remove one Islamic regime only to replace it with another while expecting better results—Iraq is the prime example. The liberals in DC either do not understand what victory is against Islam or do not care; I believe the latter.
Get one thing straight: being against Assad is not being pro-IS(IS/IL). The devil you think you know is the same as the devil you don’t know.
Its what passes for diplomacy in that part of the world. Jordan’s king Abdulla is downright friendly with Israel but still makes obligatory anti Israeli statements.
I know he’s sent his dogs to Israeli veterinarians and I believe at least one of his kids went to Tel Aviv for an emergency surgery a few years back.
~That’s like saying Iran’s “done nothing about it”. Assad, like the Mullahs, always acts via proxies such as Hezbollah and even Hamas of the Muslim Brotherhood.~
Que bono? What is his real interest vs Israel? Or maybe you are familiar with some exact fact when he ordered some anti-Israel op to Hezbollah? Let me know if you do.
Democracy is easy. It's called mob rule. A republic is much harder. Executing it as the United States required the efforts of what was arguably the most literate and well-informed portion of a country (Great Britain) that had worked for centuries to develop the concepts necessary to institute a republic, based on knowledge of the flaws of Greece and Rome.
And then we flushed it down the toilet in 1912. Then, for good measure we hit the flush valve again in 1932, 1964, 1988, 2000, and 2008. Wilson and FDR cracked the code: Institutionalize radical (FDR's own word) concepts and politicize the courts. Then it doesn't matter if you lose the next election. The bureaucrats and lifetime judges you've hired will bridge the gap until you can get elected again. Ratchet. Ratchet. Ratchet.
Like it or not, Russia has been RIGHT EVERY TIME regarding this so-called “Arab Spring”..
Maybe you forgot about the Nakba Day attack on the Golan back in 2011? or the Yom Kippur War, where Syria under the rule of Bashar’s dad attacked Israel?
“Bashir Assad is the true moderate in Syria.”
Totally true, at least by Middle East standards. He had NO PROBLEM protecting his large Christian population...a population that is now running for their lives from our “friends” there.
~There is no “lesser evil” there.
And of course you can’t remove one Islamic regime only to replace it with another while expecting better results—Iraq is the prime example. The liberals in DC either do not understand what victory is against Islam or do not care; I believe the latter.
Get one thing straight: being against Assad is not being pro-IS(IS/IL). The devil you think you know is the same as the devil you don’t know.~
I’m sorry, nothing personal, but you might be a really bad chess player.
No serious problem may be solved at once this way.
Is your solution to escalate right now and nuke Mecca or what? I assure you that even such a radical solution won’t solve a problem but actually heavily worsen it.
Don’t purge a cat if you have a pest problem. Why won’t you let her solve a problem no matter how nasty she is? Does it matter what color a cat is or even if she scratches or defecates in a bathroom sometimes? Rats are much worse, they are about plague and you aren’t in a position to effectively deal with them on your own.
They’re not playing chess there. I would say they are going by Sun Tzu’s “Art Of War” instead, especially the part about feigning disorder in order to crush their real enemy (ch. 1 verse 20)
The only fact on the ground there is that all major Islamic factions are dead against the Little Satan (Israel) and the Great Satan.
~Maybe you forgot about the Nakba Day attack on the Golan back in 2011? or the Yom Kippur War, where Syria under the rule of Bashar’s dad attacked Israel?~
Yom Kippur War was decades ago.
As for another incident I wouldn’t call it an attack in any serious sense.
Was any weapon fired from the Syrian side and how do you know Assad was behind it?
Anyway it is a kid’s games comparing to what ISIS is doing on daily basis.
Let Assad fall and Israel would have to deal with things worse than an astroturf crowd on Golans.
“Secular strong men have historically our best allies in the Middle East (after Israel, of course). We keep overthrowing these people and then we get “surprised” when Muslim fanatics take over and make things worse.” — Totally agree. You’d think they learned from Carter’s mistake in helping overthrow the Shah of Iran. But, noooo! Still helping with the islamization of that region & of course our terror threat alert keeps going up in the west too.
Russia provides some clarity where our state department and McInsane spout falsehoods
No, that is not so.
Islam wants for brutal dictators like Lord of the Flies needs adult authority. Individual liberty, freedom of association, security of one’s personal property, and the right to freedom of expression, are not compatable with Islam doctrine.
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